Motofumi Kobayashi’s Cat Shit One: Another great reason to love comics. Yes, okay! As always, I have nothing clever to say in this space, but unlike always, I’m not going to waste your time saying it. I’ve got show notes with images! Links! Prizes! (There are no prizes!) Torrid confessions! (There probably will not be any torrid confessions.) After the jump: Show Note Machine…Go!

Because it is Hook Jaw, and Because it is My Heart… Yep, we are back! Sorry for our absence from the podcasting broadcast waves and of course the Savage Critic site itself. After the jump–show notes! But before we get there, I wanted to congratulate House to Astonish for their 100th Episode! I’m listening to it now, and want to recommend it for people who like what Graeme and I do but would maybe like it if it was done much better? Congrats to Al & Paul! Now, then. Where was I? Oh, right.

I’m crazy sad that Karen Berger is leaving DC Entertainment & Vertigo. As many of you know, I opened in April of 1989, so I “came up” at the same time as Vertigo, in many ways — I still have my very first order form I ever turned in, and I ordered a whopping 15 copies of SANDMAN #6, my single highest ordered comic book for that month (BATMAN #434 came in next at 12 copies). Before the year was out, we’d be selling triple-digits of SANDMAN. All of the comics that Karen oversaw — ANIMAL MAN, DOOM PATROL, SANDMAN, SWAMP THING being the most prominent — were among our biggest sellers, we were one of a new breed of… Read More…

At Graeme’s Behest: the cover to Colder #1 Yeah, that’s a pleasant way to get your Tuesday rolling, eh? Anyhoo, very truncated version of things this time around, I’m afraid but after the jump…show notes!

Good Day! Jolly Good Day! Over here we are shortly to be having a Jubilee shindig! You don’t get one so I gave you this instead. It’s all over the bally shop but some of it is about comics. You have been warned and so my hands are clean but look at the state of your fingernails!

First off, our new graphic is courtesy of the incredibly talented Adam P. Knave (who on top of all the other things he does and does well, has added podcaster to the mix. Go check out The Glory, The Glory, why don’t you?) and our old dashed-off scattershot introductions to the podcast, courtesy of me who has once again managed to land himself behind a scheduling eightball. But! That doesn’t mean we didn’t attend to our duties, as far as answering your questions go. On the contrary, Episode 84 of Wait, What? is our first hour and forty five minute foray into the savage wilds of your inquiries. Among the ground covered by Graeme McMillan and me: our recommendations for… Read More…

Hey, guess who did it wrong? Yeah, I had an incredibly busy Wednesday and it wasn’t until my head hit the pillow that I remembered I’d forgotten to upload this podcast. And create this entry. So, despite my fond reveries about providing extra content and blahblahblahblah, that will probably have to wait until next week because, well, I’m tired and dumb. But I wasn’t (entirely) when Graeme and I talked now comics for our conclusion to Episode 79! Nope, I was more or less lucid and we reviewed the latest issues of Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Angel and Faith, Frankenstein, Agent of Shade, Batwoman, and a whole mess of first first issues including Saucer Country, Crossed Badlands, Saga, Avengers Assemble, and… Read More…

It’s a post about comics! Is it early? Is it late? Time is in flux! Only if one man can face his Pull List can The Balance be restored! One Man. One Pull List. There will be Words… (…probably the wrong ones).

A couple of posts down from this rubbish there is a quite extraordinary thing occurring. People are discussing Digital comics and no one has been killed! It’s a Christmas miracle, by Jove! Why not go have a looksee, this rot isn’t going anywhere.

Ah, mishaps. They seemed to plague Graeme and I during the recording of Wait, What? Ep. 62 but somehow we were able to wrest a podcast from the vile clutches of “why isn’t this recording? Dear God, how long has this not been recording?” So I have to warn you in advance, we only have one installment for you this week and it is just a dash over an hour long, answering your questions from our earlier post here on this website. Warning Number Two: we don’t discuss Josie & The Pussycats. I just liked the image and needed a bit of Dan DeCarlo-inspired sunshine in my day. But we do talk kid-friendly books in the New52, Matt Fraction and… Read More…

So, yeah, I read something and then I went and wrote about it all half-assed like and if you aren’t doing the chores you might want to hunker down a spell and take a look. Might not as well. Ain’t no skin off mine. Ah, there’s just nothing like a merciless black-hearted look at human nature to lift your spirits is there?

Taken on its own, DAYTRIPPER #10 is a weirdly underwhelming end to what’s been one of my favorite series in recent times; it continues with last issue’s break from format by not killing Bras at the end of the issue, and offers, instead, something of a happy ending – but it also feels… I don’t know, sparer than earlier issues, for some reason, less of a story than a coda, if that makes sense. Thing is, when you read the entire series in one sitting – and I really, really recommend that you do – that calm and space seems more fitting, and has more impact.

There’s been a couple of other opinion pieces going around this last week, using my latest TILTING AT WINDMILLS as a starting point. Most notably from Johanna, and from Christopher Butcher. This is good, I like debate. Here’s the thing though: I’m not sure if it is because I’m a lousy writer (guilty!), or if people are reading what they want to read rather than what I intended to say. I’ve been using Vertigo as my example because Vertigo has a (unstated but crystal clear) program where periodical series UNIFORMALLY get collected at about month #9 in what I think any reasonable person will conclude is the SUPERIOR value – it is cheaper, sometimes by nearly as much as half… Read More…

There’s something really kind of sad about GOD SAVE THE QUEEN, the new Vertigo graphic novel by Mike Carey and John Bolton. Not necessarily in the content of the book itself, although it’s hardly the greatest thing that you’ll read this year – or even this week, arguably – but just the fact that it’s being published at all in 2007. For anyone who’s read almost any Vertigo in the past – especially any high-profile Vertigo – then this book seems like nothing so much as the comic book equivalent of a Vertigo tribute cover band. The plot is just a mash-up of old Vertigo series (Look, the main character is a mix of Fairy and human, just like Tim… Read More…